


As Though They Were Nightingales

by I_bite_my_thumb_at_thee



Series: Swan Song [2]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia and Jaskier | Dandelion Go To The Coast, M/M, Memory Loss, No Major Character Death, old!Jaskier, saying goodbye
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:07:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26892676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_bite_my_thumb_at_thee/pseuds/I_bite_my_thumb_at_thee
Summary: "You can tell me all about your adventure. You really should take me with you the next time.”“I will.”He won’t. The only adventure Geralt had left was the quiet life with Jaskier at the coast and the only thrill he needed was watching Jaskier’s eyes light up every time he met Geralt for the first time again.Or: Jaskier is an old man and Geralt has to come to terms with Jaskier's fading memory
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: Swan Song [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2101497
Comments: 60
Kudos: 240
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	As Though They Were Nightingales

**Author's Note:**

> Whumptober Prompt 8: Don't say Goodbye

„Geralt, you‘re back!”

Jaskier’s eyes lit up, when he saw Geralt enter their small cabin. His smile added new wrinkles to the numerous ones already there.

Crow’s feet, Yennefer had called them decades ago. For Geralt the wrinkles were a reminder of a lifetime filled with laughter and bright smiles. Though he wasn’t the one in need of a reminder. He would never forget the decades he had been blessed with Jaskier’s presence. 

Geralt closed the door behind him and went over to sit by Jaskier, taking his old hand in his. The skin wasn’t smooth anymore and the fingers were crooked from age, unable to elicit music from the lute that had been lying in its case unused for years now. 

“I bought you a notebook.”

Jaskier let go of his hand to take to book from him, stroking the forget-me-not on the cover with a fond expression. 

“This is perfect. I have just finished filling my last one.”

“I know.” 

Jaskier had shown it to him, proud like he had always been of his creations and exited to share them with Geralt. He had looked at every page, had let Jaskier explain to him the meaning of every line he had written. 

Jaskier had looked at him with eager anticipation that almost gave him his years back. 

“Come on, three words or less,” he had teased.

“It’s perfect,” Geralt had said and he had meant it. It was perfect, because it was Jaskier’s and it made him happy. It didn’t matter that Geralt hadn’t been able to read a single word. Jaskier’s hands have long ago began shaking too much to produce anything readable anymore, but if writing gave Jaskier joy then that was everything Geralt could ask for. 

No, that wasn’t true. He wanted so much more than that. He wanted Jaskier to be young again, to be able to travel with him and let Geralt show him all the far off places he wouldn’t ever be able to travel to now. 

At least he had been able to show him the coast. 

Jaskier looked up from the journal and his eyes widened in surprise. 

“Geralt! You’re back!” 

His heart clenched painfully. It was fine, he told himself. He was used to this. 

That didn’t make it any less painful. 

“How nice of you to visit me,” Jaskier said lightly, as though the words didn’t break Geralt’s heart. “It has been far too long. How long can you stay, before you go hunting again?”

Forever. Geralt would stay forever by Jaskier’s side, as he had done for years now. Long gone were the days that Geralt only visited their cabin in between his hunts. For almost a decade he had been living here, taking care of Jaskier, helping him eat and walk and stroking his thinning hair as he went to bed wishing for the mercy of being granted more time with him. The only times Geralt still did his witchering, as Jaskier still called it after all those years, was when he accompanied the neighbouring fisherman-family to protect them from sirens and the like. 

“I can stay with you for however long you need me to,” Geralt said and never had anything felt more true. 

“Wonderful!” Jaskier said with a sly smirk. “Then you can tell me all about your adventure. You really should take me with you the next time.”

“I will.” 

He won’t. The only adventure Geralt had left was the quiet life with Jaskier at the coast and the only thrill he needed was watching Jaskier’s eyes light up every time he met Geralt for the first time again. 

“Wait, just let me get my quill.” 

Jaskier moved slowly. It was obvious how much it pained him to take even small steps, the ache in his old joints sighing with every movement. 

Geralt was tense, ready to jump up at any moment to catch Jaskier, should he stumble. He could have gotten the quill for Jaskier, but time and time again, he had been told that Jaskier wanted to know that he was still able to do things on his own. 

The triumphant “Aha!” as Jaskier found the quill and almost dried up inkwell and sat back down, warmed Geralt’s chest. Watching all the pain of aching bones was bearable, when it gave him the sight of Jaskier still finding joy in the small things, as he had always done. 

Jaskier looked up at Geralt expectantly, quill and the new notebook at the ready. 

Geralt swallowed. There was no adventure to tell him off. Maybe later Geralt would tell Jaskier the truth, how he had met the fisher’s daughter on the way to the marked and helped repair her wagon, how he had had trouble buying all the essentials in this time of year. 

Later, Jaskier would be happy to listen to the trivial things Geralt had to say. Now, he was attentively waiting for a heroic tale. 

So Geralt gave him a tale. He told him about the time he had fought a cockatrice – one of Jaskier’s favourite stories, even though Jaskier didn’t know it. 

As every time, Geralt told the story, Jaskier made inappropriate comments and laughed and gasped at the same parts he always did. 

“Oh, this will make the most beautiful ballad! Oh, what should I call it?” 

Geralt muttered the same thing he always said when Jaskier asked him for a title for this specific tale. An innuendo, of course. 

Jaskier let out a barking laugh. “That is genius, my dear! Just you wait, I will make a poet out of you, after all.” 

Geralt took the praise. It was easier than explaining that it had been Jaskier who had come up with the title of the ballad that he had already written ages ago, and unwittingly rewritten so many times after that. 

“Will you take me to see the sea, Geralt?” Jaskier said after a while. 

Geralt nodded and made to guide Jaskier outside. 

“No, wait. I need my jacket first.”

“You are already wearing a jacket.” 

Jaskier hit his arm playfully. “Yes, but it’s too dark. When going outside in summer, you should always wear bright colours to make the flowers jealous. Not that you would ever do that,” he added with a teasing wink.

“You’ll be cold.”

“I’ll have you to keep me warm.” Jaskier said it so casually that it made Geralt’s heart clench. Even after all this time, even though Jaskier couldn’t remember most of the times Geralt had kept him warm, he was still so sure that he would. 

He sat Jaskier down on the small bench in front of their cabin, looking out over the sea. Jaskier sighed wistfully. 

“I had always wanted to show you the coast. It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

“It is,” Geralt agreed. It really was. It was beautiful and it was painful and Geralt knew that in years to come, he would never see the coast again, because it held to many memories of Jaskier and he wouldn’t be able to bear seeing the waves crash onto the shore without having Jaskier next to him to watch it with. 

A breeze brushed Jaskier’s hair that matched Geralt’s in its colour, away from his forehead. Geralt laid an arm around Jaskier, doing his best to shield him from the wind, but it wasn’t enough to stop Jaskier from shivering. 

All the warm colour of the summer jacket wasn’t enough to combat the bitter cold of winter. 

Geralt stood up. 

“Where are you going?” Jaskier asked, eyes suddenly fearful and he clutched Geralt’s hand in his.

Geralt’s heart skipped a beat at the quivering in Jaskier’s voice. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll be back. I am just getting you a blanket.” 

Jaskier nodded, but he didn’t let go. 

“Jaskier…”

“There is something I need to tell you, before you leave.” He sounded so earnest, hope and worry mixing into a painful harmony. “I’ve been meaning to tell you for years.” 

Geralt knew what Jaskier was going to say and yet his heart sped up, like the first time Jaskier had said these words to him. 

“What is it?”

“I love you.” 

No matter how often Geralt heard the words repeated, no matter how often Jaskier said them for the first time, hearing them was still as breath-taking and unbelievable as it had always been. 

“I love you too.” 

Jaskier’s smile as Geralt said the words made it all worth it. It made him endure. 

He genlty pried his hand from Jaskier’s cold fingers. As much as Geralt longed to stay and make this moment last, he needed to get Jaskier the blanket. He prayed that when he got back outside the moment would still be present in Jaskier’s mind. 

He felt Jaskier’s pale eyes on him, as he went inside the cabin again. 

“Goodye, Geralt.” 

He froze. Agonisingly slow, he turned to face Jaskier. “Don’t say that. Please, don’t, Jaskier. You never say goodbye. You always say –“

“I don’t think I’ll be seeing you around.” Jaskier’s voice was small, but for once his eyes were clear. “I am not stupid, Geralt. I know I am old. I know I am forgetting. It feels – it feels like I am trapped in my own mind and there are windows that show me the outside world and there are doors and I know if I pick the right one, I will understand. But I never find the right door.” He swallowed. He rubbed his fingers, whether out of nervousness or because of the cold, Geralt couldn’t tell. “Some doors are locked. And I am afraid one day I will not be able to walk through the door that tells me who you are, anymore.”

His eyes never left Geralt’s, as though Jaskier was trying to drink in the sight of him. As though he thought it was the last time seeing him. 

Fear plunged its ugly claws into Geralt’s chest.

“You don’t need to remember me. I will let you get to know me again and again, if I have to. I will always come back to you. Even if the memory of me leaves you, I won’t.”

“No,” Jaskier said, a sad smile tugging at his lips. “But I think that I might. Maybe not today. Maybe not for years to come. But one day, I will leave you and I might not get the chance to say goodbye then.”

“Don’t say that.” It sounded harsher than Geralt intended. He tried to close himself off, to keep all emotion out of his face, but the impassive mask cracked. It had been too long since he had worn it. There had been no need to put it on while he was with Jaskier. Geralt hadn’t worn the mask for so long that now that he so desperately needed it, it didn’t fit anymore. 

Jaskier tilted his head to the side, a smile still playing on his lips. “For years you complained that I wasn’t telling the truth in my songs and now that I am saying the truth, you don’t want it.”

“It’s not the truth.”

“Maybe it isn’t your truth, but it’s mine. And it would be so much easier if it was yours too.”

He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t listen to another word of this. 

Geralt all but fled into the cabin, leaning against the wall with closed eyes, trying and failing to get his breath under control. To get the words out of his mind. 

It wasn’t the truth. Not yet. 

Damn it, it wouldn’t be easier if he accepted it. Denying it and shoving the thought of the day that Geralt wouldn’t be seeing Jaskier around anymore as far away from his mind as he could at least allowed him to hope. To forget that there would ever be a time where no one would greet him and await his recounting of adventures long past. 

He grabbed the woollen blanket from the rocking chair where Jaskier liked to look at books he couldn’t read anymore and balled it in his fists, before willing the tension to go away. Jaskier shouldn’t have to see him like this.

With a shaky breath, Geralt went back. 

Jaskier was looking over the sea, a faraway look in his eyes, as he listened to the seabirds’ cries as though they were nightingales. He didn’t even throw so much as glance at Geralt. 

Geralt didn’t know whether Jaskier was angry because of what Geralt had said or whether he was too lost in his world of closed doors.

Carefully he put the blanket around Jaskier’s shoulders, tugging it tightly around him, before he sat down next to him. 

Jaskier flinched and looked up at him, startled, before he broke out in a smile so bright, it could banish the winter wind tugging at their hair. 

“Geralt! You’re back!”

Geralt closed his eyes, tried to put the mask back on, tried not to notice the crack in his heart that Jaskier’s words had left. 

“You need to tell me about the adventure you had!”

“Maybe some other time,” Geralt said and he knew he couldn’t keep the thickness out of his voice. “For now, can we just… be here?”

Jaskier took his hand and squeezed it gently. “Of course, dear. I will still be here, when you are ready to tell the story.”

An iron chain wound around Geralt’s chest, getting tighter and tighter, making it hard to breathe. “I know.”

Geralt didn’t know for how long they just sat there, looking at the sea. As the sun began to set, Geralt found his words. This one, he knew, wasn’t a story Jaskier had forgotten just yet, but he told it anyway. He didn’t know, if Jaskier was even still listening, if he was aware of Geralt’s presence next to him. But as Geralt spoke about a day in Posada, about a devil and an annoying yet brave bard, he felt Jaskier’s hand twitch in his. 

When he turned his head, Jaskier was still looking out at the sea, but there was a smile on his lips, lines around his eyes deepening with the memory of laughter. 

Even when Geralt had finished the story, Jaskier still didn’t speak. It was only much later, when Geralt guided him back inside, put him to bed and pressed a kiss against his forehead that Jaskier finally found his words again.

“Will you do me a favour, Geralt?”

Geralt didn’t need to speak to let Jaskier know his answer. The look on the bard’s face told him that he already knew it. That Jaskier could ask for anything, ask for black pearl of Skellige that only existed in legends and romantic men’s hearts and Geralt would give it to him. 

“Go find a new adventure.” _After I’m gone._

Jaskier didn’t say the words, but Geralt knew that was what he meant. His throat became tight, but he nodded anyway.

Jaskier smiled and lifted his hand to caress Geralt’s cheek. “Thank you, my love.”

For a heartbeat there was silence, only the rush of the waves outside that would lull Jaskier to sleep. 

Then, quietly, Geralt spoke the words that broke his heart but freed him from the chains around his chest. The words that Jaskier deserved to hear, at least this once.

“Goodbye, Jaskier.” 

Jaskier’s eyes turned soft as Geralt took his hand from his cheek and pressed a soft kiss on it. 

“See you around, Geralt.”


End file.
